Tuesday, December 1, 2009

As part of my continuing series on how to make faux play food for kids to play with, here is how I constructed and made my own tea bags. Every little girl just loves serving her family and friends some tea!

Note: I prefer hand sewing with two strands of embroidery floss. I find that it holds up better and is stronger than regular sewing thread.

Pattern: 2 1/4" by 2" square (tea bag), 1 3/4 by 1 1/2" square (tea) and a 1 1/4" by 1 1/4" square (tag). Notice the first two measurements are not exactly square shapes. Cut these three shapes from paper to use as patterns.

Cutting Felt: You will need to cut one tea bag shape from cream colored felt, two tea shapes from dark brown felt and two tag shapes from cream colored felt.

Assembly: Using a sewing needle and small whip stitches, hand sew the 'tea' square shape to each side of the cream colored tea bag. If desired, you can add just a tad of poly fiber fill stuffing inside to add a tad of puffiness to your 'faux bag'. Cut a 12" long piece of cream colored embroidery floss from your hank (spool). Thread it slightly through the top section of one side of your tea bag (I have mine threaded through the dark tea square). Loop it around and knot at the top. Take your two pieces of cream colored felt squares (tag squares) and sandwich them over top of your knot. Using cream colored embroidery floss, hand sew around all four edges of your tag square.

Your faux felt tea bag is now complete. You can sit and hand sew several of these while watching television or a movie. It is a great take-along project for when you are traveling too!